Ink Applicator/Blender Review

I have been using the old rectangle Distress Ink Applicator/Blending tool for a while now.  In my opinion the felt rectangles are too small.  But I make it work by using two of them or cutting my own.  If the Velcro underneath sticks out it can scratch your card.

But I recently noticed that many people are now using a round version of this tool.  I decided to give it a try and I do not like it.  The felt has been replaced with a sponge like pad that grips the paper and leaves big ink marks.  I had a very hard time getting the ink to blend and was not happy with the change.     

Sometimes I just use a piece of felt and not the tool part at all.  The long piece in the photo shows that I would use one color and then move down a little bit when I changed colors.  The next thing from Ranger/Tim Holtz will be little felt covers for your fingers; like a sewing thimble only felt.  You heard it here first ;) 

So, have you tired both?  Which do you prefer?

Secret Santa Stamps

This is my 5th year to participate in the Secret Santa stamp swap.  The 1st year we got an awesome Santa stamp that we planted near Santa Claus, Indiana.  The 2nd year we got a tiny frog stamp that we sent off as a hitchhiker.  The 3rd year we received a stamp of Charlie Brown, Snoopy & tree, that has recently gone missing.  Last year we got a Gingerbread man, that we sent out as a hitchhiker.

This year our Secret Santa was RideTheMoose (fun trail name).  She sent these cool stamps AND some chocolates!  One of the great things about these stamps is that they were carved on materials that I have never seen before.  The white one is labeled, "seed" and I don't know what the pink one is.  They are both much thicker than Speedball pink.

I will probably plant the strawberry in the spring and the leaf guy in the fall.  Thank you RideTheMoose :)

Self Portrait Collage LTC

This is my card for Beetle's "Self Portrait Collage" LTC swap.  My card is called, "Route 66."

My original idea for this swap was to carve a selfie and put that stamp on a photo background.  I sat down
and played around with the photo edit software for 30 minutes until I got the image in a way I could carve it.  I struggled with the carving and then Beetle posted on the tracker about how the photo could be printed.  I went back and reread the instructions and realized that I wasn't supposed to carve a selfie :(

Original Photo

So  I decided that I would remake one of my vacation photos.  I carved the stamp of the car and the Route 66 sign, colored everything with Sharpies, added my photo, and attached to the map background paper.  About half way through I thought that the darker (top) map paper would look better and I switched.

Unnecessary Selfie now a PT 

They turned out pretty good.  Kinda a pain to color them all.  I really should read the instructions before the start on my stamps/cards!  I love the little photo corner holder things :)

Him LTC

This is my card for Team Awesome Pants' "Him" LTC swap.  My cards is called "Track 12."  For this swap TAP made a Praise and Worship CD.  Participants were supposed to pick a number and she would send the song title that went with that track on the CD.  We were asked to keep our song titles top secret and I found it very hard to not share my card on Facebook.

I got Track 12: Our Great God.  I had never heard this song before.  About a year and a half ago we switched to a baptist church that only sings hymns and I don't listen to Christian radio.  It's a great song, but the first time I listened to it nothing jumped out at me for the LTC.  I thought about making a plain worship card with silhouettes of people with their hands raised on a gelli print background.  

But when I listened the second time the end of the last verse got my attention.  It says, "Let all the moons and all the stars, In all the universe, Sing praises to the living God, Who rules them by His Word." 

Him: Track 12

I jumped on Pinterest and started looking for space ATCs.  I found two videos of this background.  In the first video the woman is hard to understand and she doesn't tell what colors she is using.  I like her card better because it has more blue.  But I followed the second video because she gives more detailed instructions.  

I played around with different papers for this technique.  The woman in the video says she uses watercolor paper.  I tired card stock, Bristol, and watercolor.  Card stock worked best for me.  I rubbed the ink on, dripped water, blotted, let it dry, and splatted white paint with a tooth brush.  Then I glued my space background to the grey background, stamped my text stamp, and attached my moon with a 3D glue dot.  I LOVE how these cards turned out :) 

Christmas LTC's 2016

I believe this is my 4th year to participate in Beetle's Christmas LTC swap and my card is called, "The Reason for the Season."

 I found my image and carved it right away but I was torn on the background.  I really wanted to glue some burlap fabric to the card. But in the tracker Beetle asks that you don't make your cards too heavy because it is a large swap (30 people).

I was on online looking at craft supplies and saw the Tim Holtz burlap stencil.  I bought it but still had problems deciding how to use it.  I sprayed ink on it, rubbed ink on with a Distress Ink Applicator, and brushed acrylic paint on it.  I didn't like how any of those turned out.

Christmas LTCs 2016: The Reason for the Season

I got to thinking about my card from two years ago.  Here is the link to that Blog post with step by step instructions and photos.  Because this is such a large swap I was only going to make 30 cards.  But I got down to the end and ran out of paper.  I thought about using different paper on that last one but my OCD kicked in and I went to Hobby Lobby and bought more paper.  Now I have 5 extra cards.

In the tracker Beetle asks that you share a Christmas memory with your card.  One of my favorite Christmas memories is performing in the live nativity as a Girl Scout at our zoo.  The zoo provided children's costumes, played the story on a tape, and we would go out into the petting zoo area with sheep, goats, llama, etc.  It was a lot of fun and afterward we would get hot chocolate and cookies.  Our zoo is run by the city so they would never allow that type of thing now but it was fun the few times we did it

This picture was taken in 1987 and I am the magi with the blue hat holding the candle next to the angel.  My mom has a boatload of pictures in her basement and thankfully I only had to go thru 2 photo albums to find this pic.

Fast Food LTCs

Daddy's Favorite Princess and I are participating in Mommy's HERBs "National Fast Food Day 2016" LTC swap.

This was the princesses idea and of course she picked McDonald's.  She carved the golden arches and I carved her text.  We looked for a way to make her card more interesting and found the burger & fry washi tape on Etsy.

I picked Jimmy John's for my card.  My husband and I ate lunch there shortly after I joined this swap and I asked for an extra sandwich paper for the background of my cards.

I think our cards look great and we will look for a place to hide them on November 16th, National Fast Food Day.

Shawnee National Forest

Shawnee Forest Bigfoot

A few months ago one of my Facebook friends posted a pic of the Shawnee Forest Bigfoot.  I thought I have to plant a box there.  I got the box ready but never made it over to plant it.

Last week some of my kids were on Fall Break and we took advantage of the time off and nice weather to go over and play.  We hiked, climbed, and hid two letterboxes.

I hoped the leaves would have been more colorful but the weather was beautiful.  The kids really love climbing all over the rocks.  There were more people there than I thought there would be.  I guess a lot of kids were on break.

Kids at Garden of the Gods

It would be nice if it was closer to home.  I thought it was an hour away but it is an hour and a half.  And of course my kids can't sit that long without trying to kill each other.  We got almost there and I had to move the kids around.

I hope we can go camping over there sometime soon.  Maybe we can talk everyone into going there Mother's Day weekend :)

Steampunk LTC

Card supplies / my messy desk 

This is my card for Housepitality Hostess's "STEAMPUNK Top Hats & Mustaches."  It doesn't have any hats or mustaches.  Don't tell HH, maybe she won't notice ;)

I really enjoyed making my card.  I started off stamping a text stamp on card stock with tan ink.  Then I rubbed two different brown distress inks and black ink over the text.  I also sprayed the background with Tattered Angels gold spray.

STEAMPUNK: Ladybug

Then I stamped the light and gear stamps on.  I wanted to emboss these but some of the detail was lost when I tried it so I just stamped them.  It was fun to play with these cling stamps :)

I stamped my ladybug on a dark red and roughed the edge with the grey/red circle thing in the first pic.  Then I put the screw like brads on the red paper.  The ladybug was attached to the background which was glued to the same dark red as the ladybug.

I thought about stamping a mustache on the back but didn't.  I like my cards.  But I have a feeling that the others will be cooler.

LTC Tea Party

These are my cards for Wise Wanderer's "LTC Tea Party" swap.  I really enjoyed making them.  My card is called, "Teapot House."

I used this background technique before and decided to do it again.  I had some of it leftover from the first time and used it on a few cards.

For these cards, I used Watercolor paper.  I sprayed the paper with water, then Tattered Angels Glimmer Mist, and you wrinkle up some plastic wrap and press it onto the paper.  I love the wrinkle effect and the gold that is left on the paper when they dry.

When they are dry you remove the plastic wrap and cut the cards to size.  I wanted to add a doily to my card but didn't want to hide the background that I loved.  I found this Tim Holtz stencil and spread Texture Paste on it and let it dry.  I liked it but I wanted to add some color.

Once the Texture Paste was dry I daubed some gold ink on the doily area.  I liked it but I probably should have pulled some of the paste out of the jar, added some gold paint, and then smeared it through the stencil.  I also rubbed some of the gold ink around the edge of the card.

LTC Tea Party: Teapot House

Then I stamped, cut out my stamp image, and glued it on with a glue stick.  I discussed with Daddy's Favorite Princess if I should color parts of the teapot.  She said that it looked best plain.  So I left it at that.  I should have carved my stamp a little smaller but I think they look great.

200 years in Indiana event

Shelter House

My event was Saturday, September 24th at Lincoln State Park.  It was a little warmer than I had hoped but over all it was a good day.   We had 50 people from all over the country- CA, IA, MO, IL, IN, OH, KY, TN & MI.

Friday evening we set up camp.  We were camping with my parents, sister & husband, and my two nieces.  They went to Holiday World on Saturday and didn't attend my event.  It was nice to not have to worry about the kids while doing event stuff.

Boxers Stamping

On Friday night, I had to climb to the fire tower to hide the box that I couldn't find the last time I was out planting.  All of the kids wanted to go.   A little after 8 we left the campground.  We hiked to the fire tower, planted the box, and finished the loop back to the campground.  We got back around 9:30.  It was cool to walk the trail and go in the fire tower at night.

The shelter was really close to the campground and our site.  Saturday morning we loaded up a wagon and took items to the event.  My kids helped with table cloths and setting out table top boxes before they left for Holiday World.  One of my kids wanted to stay but I told him he would enjoy Holiday World more.

Food & Stamps

It was nice to get to meet so many local folks.  When we hosted our event like this in 2012 we were looking forward to meeting local boxers.  Then most of the people who came were from out of town.  But this time many of the locals came.  It is nice to put a face with the names and stamps you find :)

 People came and went from the shelter all day.  I knew that I would be camped out there all day but I didn't know how many people would hang around.  For about an hour in the late afternoon it was just me & my husband.  We cleaned up a little bit and talked about taking a nap.  Are you a bad host if you nap while all your participants are out on the trail? ;)

Our Site 

I totally forgot about the group photo!  I had planed on doing one after lunch when a lot of people were at the shelter.  But I had also said that we would play BINGO after lunch.  Some of the young ladies were asking about BINGO and I got focused on that and forgot the picture.  Oh well, I think everyone had a good time.

Sunday morning my crew wanted to walk a trail so we walked the penny trail.  On our way out of the park we planted the event stamp.  I would like to go out in November and check all the boxes, make sure they are in their spots, and covered up.  I also have one stamp that I need to return to its owner.

Hosting an event like this is a lot of work.  I am control freak and like to do everything myself.  But I think if I am going to do an event like this again, I will need help :)

Event Planting Finished

Pizza Revolution 

They were calling for rain on Saturday but it ended very early.  I had 4 Etsy orders late last week so I spent the morning carving stamps for that.

My husband took the big boys to complete a project and I had the little two.  We were supposed to have BLT's for supper so we stopped at the Farmer's Market on our way out of town to get some tomatoes.

Lincoln Bicentennial Plaza

The rain sacred many people and vendors away.  There are always a few food trucks there and one is a double decker pizza bus.  We have talked about trying it before but we usually go to the Farmer's Market first thing and it is too early for lunch.  But it was a little after 11 and we gave it a try.  The kids got a 4 meat pizza called The Big Bad Wolf and I had the Fun Guy.  It was really good.

After the Farmer's Market we stopped at a gas station and headed to the park.  We paid to get in and parked at the Lincoln Bicentennial Plaza.  We used the restroom and checked out the plaza before hiking our trail.

Fungus

We  planted 36 boxes for our Famous Hoosiers series.  There were many cool fungus on the path.  We saw another large yellow one but that pic turned out fuzzy.  The kids were pretty grouchy again while hiking.  At one point Lil Ewok had a melt down and said, "Why do I have to carry everything!"  He was carrying his shoes and a walking stick.  I told him that if he wanted to take his shoes off he had to carry them.  I didn't realize that 3 things were everything.

Kids writing their name on the trail

Once again I worried about planting the boxes too close together or too far apart.  I think I plant them closer at the start of the trail and farther as we go along.  This path had many fallen trees, stumps, and cut logs to use as hiding places.  We came across some Cub Scouts while we were out.  We let them pass so we could keep planting.  

I made a small box in a mini Altoids tin that I wanted to plant at the fire tower but the kids lost it.  I am going to search the car again and if I can't find it I will make it again.  That means I will have to drive to the park and hike again!  I may wait and plant it Friday night after we set up camp.

Planting selfie

I need to get stuff together for the meal and make my signs.  I think I am almost ready :)

Event Planting Part 2

I have been planning for months to go out to the park on Saturday and plant more of my event boxes but they are calling for rain.  So I decided I would go out today with Lil Ewok.  There was an issue with my kids school, Turtle Boxer & Daddy's Favorite Princess were off today, and I had extra "help".

There is a big road construction project less than a block from the school.  They turned off the water and when they turned it back on again something at the school broke.  They tried to fix it during the night but were not able to get the job done.  They had to have the water off to work on it.  That meant no sink, toilets, or school.

We headed out to the park to plant another 28 boxes.  The kids about drove me crazy.  (Short trip, I know.)  They wanted to just put the box in the hiding spot and run off to find another spot.  I had to explain to them that I had to make notes, write down landmarks, tree names, get left/right correct, etc.  After a while they did settle down.

It sprinkled on us for just a few minutes but being in the woods we didn't really get wet.  We mainly heard it hitting the leaves of the trees.  I only took one picture on the trip.  Lil Ewok played games on my phone the whole way over and ran my battery down.  My phone died and I don't know how many steps I walked!!

I just have 38 more boxes to plant.  I will watch the weather on Saturday and if the rain holds up I will have to go out on Tuesday.  The event is just over a week away :D

Event Planting Part I

Planting selfie 

I went out on Saturday and started planting boxes for my event.  The weather was perfect.

I started off looking for an old box in the park because I wanted to plant on the same trail.  As soon as I got to the hiding spot and big group of people came up.  They were geocaching and asked if I was too.  I told them that I was letterboxing and we discussed the differences.  I showed the kids our new signature stamps and signed in the cache with them.

Snake skin between branches

Once they were gone I started looking for the box again.  The finder notes said that the log had decomposed but the box was there under some bark and leaves.  I  looked all over but couldn't find it and I planted my letterboxes on the path.  I will probably look for the old box again before my event.  It was last found in February of this year.

Then I planted my Life is Good in Indiana series that has 20 boxes.   (Don't let me forget that I have to return one of them when the event is over.)  I have never planted a series this big before and it is tough.  You don't want the boxes to close together and you don't want them to far apart.  I was worried about but I think it worked out pretty well.  Part of this trail is around a small lake and there was a nice breeze.

After that I planted my 6 pennies.  They are on a loop trail around a church/ cemetery/historical area in the park.  I am still temped to carve those last two pennies.  The park has an amphitheater and there was a live show that evening.  They were practicing that afternoon and as I was planting the pennies, I could hear the music floating through the forest.  It was beautiful :)

I am waiting on 3 more stamps.  I had some stamps sent to me that I wasn't expecting and had to order more Lock n Locks.  They should arrive today and I will be back out planting soon.

Rainbow!!! LTC

Rainbow!!!: Rainbow Milkshake

Daddy's Favorite Princess loves to carve stamps and make LTCs.  She is participating in the "Rainbow!!!" swap, hosted by GreaseLightning.

Not sure why but she picked a rainbow milkshake.  She picked the image and carved the stamp herself.

She really enjoyed making the background.  I have used this technique a few times myself and it is fun to play around with.  You take a cookie sheet and cover it with shaving cream.  Put a few drops of food coloring on and swirl it around.  Lay a piece of card stock on top and push down all over the paper.  Any place where the paper doesn't touch the shaving cream will be white.  Then you scrape the shaving cream off with an old gift card.

I cut the cards to size and helped her stamp them.  I stamped and she glued them to the red background.  Some of the cards turned out better that others but she is pretty proud of them :)

New Trail Names & Sig Stamps

A few months ago Daddy's Favorite Princess asked me to carve her a new trail stamp.  Her original stamp was a Hello Kitty face.  It was about the size of a quarter and she lost it.  Then I carved a Jewel Sparkles Lalaloopsy and she has been using it for a while.  But the stamp warped and it is hard for her to get a good image with it.

While we were at the Homerdoodle event she said that her trail name was too long, after a while she was just stamping table top box boxes, and not writing her name.  So we discussed the new stamp and she wanted a Shopkins image.  I added her trail name to make it easier for her when stamping a lot boxes.

While we were out hiking the trails at Homerdoodle, R2-D2 said that he would like to change his trail name.  He said if he could change it he would be more willing to go letterboxing.  Now, I don't believe that for a second but agreed to change his name and carve him a new stamp.

He said that he wanted to be Boxing Turtle.  He loves turtles right now.  But we really went back and forth on the stamp image.  He drew something up with his finger on his iPad and said do this.  I got on my laptop and designed a stamp using clipart.  He didn't like it and said "just wing it."  I said, "Have we met?  I don't wing it!"  We have been boxing for 5 years, I have 150+ traditional plants, and I never hand draw them.  We finally found something we both could agree on and I added his name to it too.

Lego Clone Trooper didn't ask for a new stamp or trail name but he got one.  When he graduated from 8th grade a few months ago, he got a phone and started using social media.  His Facebook name is Bantha Rider and is a big Star Wars fan.  So I changed his trail name to Bantha Rider and carved him a new stamp.  I really like his and he does too.

Lil Ewok is only 4 and he is staying the same.  If I gave him the chance to change it now he would probably pick a ninja turtle.  We will stick with his current name & stamp for now.


PENNY UPDATE:  I have decided not to carve more pennies.  I am in the process of painting a labeling the boxes for the event.  I don't have anymore round Lock n Locks; if I carve more pennies, I have to order more boxes.  As of right now, I have just enough boxes for the stamps that are supposed to come.  I had one person drop and I have a feeling that 1-2 more people will be removed.  That adds a few more stamps to my list but the boxes will be ready when I finish the carves.  

Event Stamps & OCD

Event boxes ready for paint

My event is one month away!  I am excited and terrified at the same time.  Back in March I set up two trackers to collect stamps.  I am shocked at the response and the number of stamps coming in!  Big "THANKS!" to everyone who have sent stamps.  If everything comes in I should have 92 stamps :)

If things go as planned, there will be 4 tails of stamps.  All About Indiana will have 28, Famous Hoosiers will have 39, Life is Good in Indiana will have 18, I have 6 Pennies, and the event stamp.

Pennies

My event is at Lincoln State Park across the highway from the Lincoln Boyhood National Memorial.  There are currently 4 letterboxes in the park.  Only one of those has a Lincoln theme and it is a store bought stamp in a geocache/letterbox hybrid.  I wanted to do have a series of Lincoln stamps.  I was looking at images and found these pennies.  I thought I could do the top 2 (Kentucky & Indiana) but the bottom 2 (Illinois & DC) were to hard for me.  I posted on the Stamp Exchange and aMAZEing adventure frog volunteered to help!!  Her carves are awesome.

I got to thinking, if I am going to have the back of 4 pennies I should have a front.  So I carved that too.  Then I carved what I thought was the back of the penny- the Lincoln Memorial.  But as I was looking online I discovered, the Lincoln Memorial is not the back of present day pennies.  They have a shield!   Now my OCD kicks in.  I need to carve the back of current pennies.  And if I am going to do that why not carve the Wheat penny too!?  I don't want to carve any more pennies but I think I have to.  I'll probably loose sleep over it if I don't :'(

Anyone out there what to take pity on a crazy woman and carve a penny?  I need it by 9/16 because I am going to plant on 9/17.

Back to School

I started this blog 4 years ago when my kids went back to school from summer vacation.  Now all the kids are in school in some way.  

Lego Clone Trooper is 14 and a freshman in high school.  This was his first year riding a school bus and using a combination lock.  He gets a little confused about where his classes are but I know he will get his schedule down soon.

R2-D2 (who will be changing his trail name soon) is 11 and in 6th grade.  He goes to a private school and has moved up to the middle school hall way.

Daddy's Favorite Princess will be 8 at the end of the month and she is in 2nd grade.  She was very excited to go back to school and see all of her girl friends.

Lil Ewok is 4 1/2 and he started prek today.   He will only be gone a few hours 3 days a week but we are both excited about it.

I've got a confession to make, I'm a little burned out on letterboxing :(  I think every year I'm a little disappointed about how few finders my boxes get.  I'm hosting my event next month and I am signed up for a few LTC swaps but once those are all done, I'm going to take a little break.  My noxer husband asked if I could walk away from it for a year.  I think that is unrealistic!  But some sort of time off will be coming.

Homerdoodle Event

Stamping on the trail

On Saturday, the kids and I went to the Homerdoodle Event in Homer, Ill.  We left at 6 am and arrived just after 9:30.  We only made one stop on the way up to go potty and grab breakfast.  I had my phone take us the "fastest route".  I think she was having problems because the roads kept getting smaller and at one point she told us to go east and then turn into a corn field.  I deiced that we would not be coming that way home.

We checked in, exchanged with the hostesses, and got our clue packet.  I think I grabbed two table top boxes and then we hit the trail.  We found a series of 19 stamps called, "Frogs are lucky! They eat what bugs them!"  All of the stamps (except for the last one) were bugs.  They were great carves and we found the stamp that I sent to the event too.

Kid Table

When we finished that trail it was time for the group photo and lunch.  After lunch Daddy's Favorite Princess wanted to stay in the a/c and stamp event/table top boxes.  We asked the hostesses if she could stay and they said yes.  They had a kid table set up with papers, markers, stamps, etc.  They also had bubbles, side walk chalk, and popsicles.

Trail Selfie 

After lunch the boys and I hit the trails again.  We did a nature series and found 22 boxes.  This was a nice shady trail and I found my 800th box during that series.  But the boys were getting grouchy and fighting over who would get the box, who would stamp first, who would put it back, etc.

Event/table top boxes

When we finished those I promised them we would stay at the shelter for a bit.  We got back and we only had 40 minutes to exchange, stamp table tops, event boxes, etc.  We stamped as many as we could and ended up staying a little late.  You know they want you to leave when they start taking your chairs away.  So we threw in the towel.

One of the hostesses had talked about a fancy playground area and I let the kids play there a while.  Lil Ewok ended up slipping on the rocks and getting a little wet.  After a while I talked the kids into getting 5 more boxes.  The stamps were wildlife in the park.

Playscape 

I would have liked to have gotten more boxes but the kids were hungry and tired so we left.  We went up the interstate and found a restaurant.  While we were there I studied the map and picked a different way home.  We got back just after 10:30 that night.  Homer is about 3.5 hours from home and my husband said that he didn't realize how far we were going.

We found 55 traditional boxes, 3 hitchhikers, 1 cootie, 64 event boxes, and a few exchanges.  I was hoping to get more traditional boxes and exchange with more people but I guess there is only so much you can do in a day.

Life is Good Again LTC

Life is Good Again: Bed & Breakfast

I am hosting a "Life is Good" LTC swap again.  I really like the simple, positive, encouraging messages from the LIG shirts and whatnot.

I like camping and I recently bought a new book of camping scrapbook paper.  I looked around the LIG camping images and picked this one.  I messed up the words on the first go so I just cut them off and carved it again.  I really like the scrapbook paper but didn't want to hide it so I stamped my stamp on vellum and attached it to the paper with a mini glue dot.

I am hosting an event in September and I thought it would be cool to have a trail of these stamps at the event.  I have asked the LTC participants to donate their stamps and I have a few coming in.  If you have a LIG stamp that you are not using, I'd be happy to take it off your hands :)

For my Indiana themed event, I think I am going to call this series of stamps "Life is Good in Indiana."  

Heart Art LTC

This is my card for Beetle's "Heart Art" LTC swap.  My card is called "Mechanical Heart" and I stole this card idea entirely from LROSEM's blog post called Comet Months.  I will go ahead and walk you thru it.

LROSEM said she starts with Watercolor paper.  I am out so I used Bristol; it is thick like Watercolor but smooth.  Take an old gift card and smear glue around and add pieces of paper.  Now, I have never used a plastic card like this and I kept spreading it to thin.  It dried super fast and you can see on the edges of some of my cards that the text pages are not attached everywhere.

You smear the glue under and over the text pages.  When the glue is dry you apply Gesso with the plastic card too.  Again, I think I should have used more Gesso simply because the next few steps didn't turn out as well as I hoped.

For the next part, I took an old sock and a Spun Sugar Distressed Ink pad.  I started off tapping the sock on the pad and rubbing the sock on the paper.  But after a while, I stamped the ink pad directly on the paper and used the sock to rub the ink around.  I was hoping that the ink would be a little darker.  Maybe I should have tried a different color.

Heart Art: Mechanical Heart

Then, you cut the cards to size and stamp your stamp.  That part was easy ;)  Now for the fun part.  You paint Tim Holtz Distress Crackle Paint (I used clear) on the cards.   My cards didn't crackle as much as I would liked.  I think the problem there was that I didn't use enough Gesso.  The Crackle paint comes in 3 colors-black, while & clear.  I played around with the other colors a little bit on my scraps.  I will have to use them on a future project!

Then I edged the cards just like LROSEM.  I wasn't really happy with the cards but sent them off anyway.  I went away on vacation for 2 weeks and looking at my extra cards again I think they are not to bad.  The background looks pinker in person.